It never ceases to amaze me that we all know the wisdom of not feeding trolls, and yet when they pop up most of us can't help engaging, when any form of attention benefits them and there is no winning against them because their whole point is to force you to engage with them and be a bother.

So, seriously, forget about them again. You'll be better off focusing on the bright (all definitions) side of the internet, like puppy and kitten videos._________________"Worse comes to worst, my people come first, but my tribe lives on every country on earth. Iíll do anything to protect them from hurt, the human race is what I serve." - Baba Brinkman

I'm not actually sure 'don't feed the trolls' is a viable solution a lot of the time, to be honest. Obviously it's very situational and we have, ultimately, just invited discussion of them into our own space since they refuse to come here and talk to us themselves (which, okay, that I can see as a questionable thing to do, for sure.)

But, in my own personal experience and as I've seen other people report... it seems like telling people not to feed the trolls just ends up silencing them and pushing them out of their own space (notably when said troll is sharing that space).

I dunno.

I just don't like the 'don't feed the trolls' advise as a blanket solution to trolls because it never seems to work and it can end up silencing the people being bullied._________________Samsally the GrayAce

I kind of disagree on don't feed the trolls. Leaving someone's bullshit unchallenged can give other onlookers the impression that they're correct/unassailable._________________"No, but evil is still being --Is having reason-- Being reasonable! Mousie understands? Is always being reason. Is punishing world for not being... Like in head. Is always reason. World should be different, is reason."
-Ed, from Digger

...and "Don't feed the trolls" often breaks down because it needs to be widely held, across multiple threads and all the other users, to in order to starve the trolls of attention and the reactions they're looking for. That's not to say it's some sort of panacea to the troll problem, just that it's not really applied effectively very often.

OK, so some stuff might need to be called just so it doesn't look like it's standing unchallenged, but I think the best way to deal with that is to call it out as wrong, briefly and politely, report abuse using whatever system there is, and then carry on with whatever sensible conversation was previously going on.

I think it's fair to say that, when someone's trolling, the best result is that you end up with a thread that's just as fun/informative/inclusive etc. as it was, and the worst is 50 pages of the troll winding up one or more people and the resulting flame wars. So really, anything that works towards the former and avoids the latter is good.

although the vocal few that ragequit the comic over recent politics -- and the Shredded Moose shitbros that don't have a goal beyond making a shit comic about jerks -- might disagree, shittywebcomics' actual position is that Sinfest has always been terrible

interesting - so the problem is that they are actually more feminist/alt-genderist than sinfest? odd that the people who think like that never seem to post here....and apparently, tat is supposed to transition from someone who saw (or at least presented) the world as pimps and bitches is supposed to instantly get feminism, etc., instantly right.

i'll admit sinfest isn't perfect. but i'll bet it's a lot funnier than the ones he names - and i give tat points for working stuff through, in full view of the public._________________aka: neverscared!
a flux of vibrant matter

this has probably come up in this thread before, but it's worth pointing out that if we had moderators, maybe accounts would get approved faster, maybe even without having to email Tat

just sayin'

but no, we have only one admin and he doesn't do much

If you've ever run a web2.0 type website, you know that a major chunk of all new user-generated stuff (including the vast majority of account registration, if that's required) is spam attempts, and it's not reasonable to keep up with it all unless you have a decent system for dealing with it in place. Rarely approving new accounts and only approving them if they email you is a pretty effective way of keeping out spam with minimal effort, but it's obviously not the ideal solution.

Taking a look at the memberlist , it can be seen that 23 new accounts have been registered in just the last couple of hours. Most of those are probably spambots crawling the internet for websites to hit, but some of them might be legit users and Tat isn't going to approve any them unless they email him, and even then it'll take some time, and maybe multiple registration attempts.

The most recent registrant to actually get to post anything is firestk, who registered in February. Their first post was made three days after they registered. The next most recent registered in January, and the third most recent was in November of last year.

Maybe if we upgraded to phpbb3 we could have more advanced registration, and maybe more advanced spam management, but that's not going to happen either, which is a shame because I'd be willing to do it for free if I had access to the server.

it's more like "shitpost everything into oblivion" and it's only a viable strategy because we don't have mods

I do think it's fairly ideal for a self-regulated board, though: In case of burgeoning religious debate, just drown it in pie, or men's shampoo, or ponies, or toasters, or dildos, or whatever, and if it tries to come up for air just keep burying it in shit until it chokes.

Alternatively, there's always the Dennis approach. That works too, but only if you're Dennis.

but the end result of this kind of behavior is people going to other forums to whine about us, giving us cute pet names in the process

From a place of fans praising (or criticising) the artist and discussion about Sinfest's many topics (amongst other things) it has certainly become a "hive of scum and villany", where the repression of different opinions and the derailing of "unwanted" threads has become common. And, while still pointing out prominently that people should stick to the forum rules, there seems to be no moderation around actually enforcing them.

Let's be very blunt for a moment and just give three examples of the mob that's waiting for you over there:

"Toothrot" - This has got to be the most loathsome forum user I have had the displeasure of reading in a long time. And it's not because of the nasty picture he's using as an avatar. But because of his arrogance and self righteous and obtrusive attitude. Once a new thread criticising the "new" Sinfest is detected, he will appear and start shelling and abusing the thread starter on a personal level. Here's one who KNOWS what's politically correct and what not. And he's also CERTAIN that any criticism on Ishida's brand of "feminism" must have something to do with the election year. This is most certainly a person who likes mobbing and will do so as often as possible as long as there's a gang of others cheering for him.

"Simian McTroll" - Don't expect this one to write anything of interest under normal circumstances. Only when the vultures circle will he appear and "share" his brand of abuse that he calls his "personal opinion" with us. He doesn't care in the end of what's it all about as long as he's with the gang. A typical, lazy opportunist.

"Ponygirl" - This one is a very sad case where somebody who should be smarter and certainly more decent takes herself way too important and considers the antisocial behaviour in the forum as "acceptable". Since there's a gang of "nice" guys and no moderation around, she's even proud of "derailing" a topic by posting pictures of this series she obviously loves so much. (Which, while not being bad, is aimed at children. Whereas Sinfest and its topics are mostly not.) Sorry, lady, but your behaviour is immature, antisocial and shameful - no matter how old you may be. Time to meet reality yourself. Adventure!

There is speculation if Ishida actually reads the forum and reacts to some of the criticism of his strips. I highly doubt it. The abuse alone that's now common in some threads should give him more than a hint of what's wrong. Hell, there's even a huge thread with a POLL that asks if the feminism storyline is overdone. And you don't have to guess what the majority thinks about it - no matter what abuse, tripe and "derailing" the 4-5 rabid trolls, hapless anime-avatars and antisocials post for the following 20+ pages.

I'm not actually sure 'don't feed the trolls' is a viable solution a lot of the time, to be honest. Obviously it's very situational and we have, ultimately, just invited discussion of them into our own space since they refuse to come here and talk to us themselves (which, okay, that I can see as a questionable thing to do, for sure.)

But, in my own personal experience and as I've seen other people report... it seems like telling people not to feed the trolls just ends up silencing them and pushing them out of their own space (notably when said troll is sharing that space).

I dunno.

I just don't like the 'don't feed the trolls' advise as a blanket solution to trolls because it never seems to work and it can end up silencing the people being bullied.

Yeah it's actually some of the most painfully useless and countereffective advice ever given.

It's just basically saying "hey if some complete shithead comes in here and starts walking all over you, the onus is on you to ignore him or we'll start blaming you for the problem"

It's funny that one group of people whining about us complains that there's no moderation, while another group whining about us tries to portray us as the most heavily moderated forum in internet history.